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Well, +10 to BS just means +1 Degree of Success, so one more shot hitting the target.

The Errata didn't actually change the average raw damage much (16 -> 14.5), but it lowered maximum damage by 6 points, reduced the chance for Righteous Fury, and took away Autofire from normal bolters. That's what "defused" the situation - though I think it's kind of sad they had to do this, as I think boltguns really ought to have that feature.

The Devastator was broken, but a Marine Squad using their boltguns on autofire and the Bolter Assault Squad Mode was nothing to scoff at either.


Regarding the Arbites shotgun - that "generic model" was what the Arbitrator was supposed to get, as per his entry in the core rulebook. That was Black Industries' idea, and this "Vox Legi" pattern neither existed nor was it planned. It's something that FFG came up with when they wrote the supplement, and apparently they felt the need to kick up its damage beyond what a bolter can do.

And I remain convinced that genetically modified does not equal "demigod" - Imperial propaganda aside. Looking both at the 40k tabletop as well as GW's own Inquisitor game, I see Space Marines that are much more vulnerable than what FFG's designers ultimately came up with. Then again, I'm not sure if that was actually intended by them, or if it isn't rather just a (unwelcome?) side-effect of how TB works in their games. After all, if they thought this was cool, why did they perceive a need to come up with stuff like the magical damage increase in the Horde rules, or the Felling trait, whose sole purpose is to make high-TB creatures including player characters more vulnerable?

Ultimately, it remains a question of preferences and interpretation, but it's safe to say that FFG Marines are way tougher than they would have to be.

Hmm..I dunno where you got that info, but nothing in DH states that the combat shotgun is the same one used by the Arbites.

And really, toughness bonus might sounds like normal armour, but might as well say that the human body will suddenly explode the moment you get punched or that a scoff mark received when falling on the pavement results in every bit of skin and muscle to the bone is ripped apart. The body can withstand damage and the mind can tolerate pain, tough guardsman more than scrawny adepts, but less than genetically enhanced Marines

 Lynata wrote:
And I remain convinced that genetically modified does not equal "demigod" - Imperial propaganda aside. Looking both at the 40k tabletop as well as GW's own Inquisitor game, I see Space Marines that are much more vulnerable than what FFG's designers ultimately came up with. Then again, I'm not sure if that was actually intended by them, or if it isn't rather just a (unwelcome?) side-effect of how TB works in their games. After all, if they thought this was cool, why did they perceive a need to come up with stuff like the magical damage increase in the Horde rules, or the Felling trait, whose sole purpose is to make high-TB creatures including player characters more vulnerable?

I would argue that FFG considers the background material the 'primary' canon, the game stats secondary. I am in no position to speak for FFG, of course. A lot fo the background certainly presents them as incredibly intimidating and powerful compared to baseline humans.

In a literal sense the Primarchs would be 'demigods' if we accept that the Emperor is a 'God' They're his 'children' and the Space marines are imbued with their essence, so they'd be a step less godly, but I don't think 'quatrogod' is in the dictionary. And that's splitting hairs, as demigod can also mean a lesser diety or (importantly) a hero.

Inquisitor Jex wrote:Hmm..I dunno where you got that info, but nothing in DH states that the combat shotgun is the same one used by the Arbites.

Dark Heresy Core Rulebook page 25, Arbitrator Starting Gear
As I said, there was no "special" Arbites shotgun around back then; this was just retroactively inserted later on with FFG's supplement. It was never planned from the beginning, though.

Inquisitor Jex wrote:And really, toughness bonus might sounds like normal armour, but might as well say that the human body will suddenly explode the moment you get punched or that a scoff mark received when falling on the pavement results in every bit of skin and muscle to the bone is ripped apart. The body can withstand damage and the mind can tolerate pain, tough guardsman more than scrawny adepts, but less than genetically enhanced Marines

I've got nothing against Toughness representing bodies being able to better withstand damage, but one could argue this is what Wounds is doing already.

My problem with FFG's version of Toughness is that it leads to characters not suffering injuries at all rather than allowing them to better deal with injuries still suffered - like how Toughness worked in GW's Inquisitor game. When your lasgun punched through someone's armour, that someone got injured. Always. Regardless of whether it was a Marine or a normal guy. What differentiated them was that the Marine's toughness meant he'd only get pushed into the first Injury level, whereas anyone else wearing the same kind of armour was still at risk of being injured worse, depending on how much damage got through.

An infinitely better and more realistic approach, methinks!

Balance wrote:I would argue that FFG considers the background material the 'primary' canon, the game stats secondary. I am in no position to speak for FFG, of course. A lot fo the background certainly presents them as incredibly intimidating and powerful compared to baseline humans.

Well, GW's background material makes Marines get injured by lasguns, too. Arguably FFG didn't care for that.
Not that this is much of a problem. There's no specific need to conform to anything GW puts out as long as GW is fine with such deviations. And Marines being that much tougher, or having such superior weapons, is just one of many, many details where FFG's games are a bit different from GW's world. The Deathwatch being independent from the Inquisition, Vostroyan Firstborn including female soldiers, Storm Troopers joining a grunt squad ... *shrug* It's quite simply their interpretation of the 41st millennium. Not everyone has to like it, though.

Balance wrote:And that's splitting hairs, as demigod can also mean a lesser diety or (importantly) a hero.

I've never heard this term to refer to "hero" ... and I really don't think this is what people are referring to when they're calling Space Marines that way. It's a deification born from the many myths and legends surrounding the Legiones Astartes. Arguably doesn't keep them from being killed by random Orks or Cultists, tho.

I guess I should note that I am following a much more "down to earth" approach on many things in 40k, and do not hold much stock in the various novel interpretations that tend to be chock-full of plot armour and exaggeration. This often brings me into opposition to those advocating a more "epic" version of the Space Marines, which I find both boring as well as inconsistent - and when it comes to RPGs even harmful, as such an approach sabotages any attempt for crossovers trying to emulate various events from the 40k timeline.

I've never heard this term to refer to "hero" ...

Nonetheless, the usage is correct.

Actually...the Arbitrator's starting gear only lists "shotgun" as in the two barrel kind, not the combat shotgun...and I don't think Arbitrators run around with a side-by-side like they were the Doom Marine

And again, this is NOT FFG's system; it is Black Industries based on another Black Industries product, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd edition. FFG just kept the line going after BL dropped it after only 2 books of the first game out of a promised 3.

Manchu wrote:Nonetheless, the usage is correct.

Not in the dictionaries I have seen.

Inquisitor Jex wrote:Actually...the Arbitrator's starting gear only lists "shotgun" as in the two barrel kind, not the combat shotgun...and I don't think Arbitrators run around with a side-by-side like they were the Doom Marine

Good point. But that's still what they were supposed to get according to that game's core rulebook.

If you look at the combat shotgun in the same book, it is visually identical to what the Arbites are depicted with. I assume it was meant as an upgrade for character progression, then, similar to Enforcer Carapace (which the Arbites unfortunately did not start out with either)?

Inquisitor Jex wrote:And again, this is NOT FFG's system; it is Black Industries based on another Black Industries product, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd edition. FFG just kept the line going after BL dropped it after only 2 books of the first game out of a promised 3.

And they maintained what I deem a mistake. It's not like TB did not attract criticism in WFRP either - in fact, the "naked dwarf issue" term comes from there?

Do you really think that TB as currently used in the various 40k RPGs distributed by FFG does a good job both in terms of game mechanics and balancing as well as "realism", or rather the feeling of 40k guns and combat in general being dangerous and deadly?

The image maybe, the description speaks of cylinder magazines, which that shotgun lacks. Not too sure about normal progression really, as Arbitrators also used bolt weaponry, and shotguns are not an arbitrator-only weapon

Don't know about the naked Dwarf issue thing, but looking around for a few moments, it seems more about the artwork for the Troll slayer is simply a bare chested Dwarf with an Orange mohawk..really, WHFRP had very little weapons with armour penetration, or that ignored armour, short of magic and the Runefangs (which both were rather rare).

And, since it seems like it is 2 questions, yes to both. Combat is dangerous and deadly, and it is well balanced to me. Of course your lasgun won't effect the tech-priest with a dragonscale Armour and few levels of 'the flesh is weak' but will be more potable against the synthskin wearing assassin who must rely on good agility to evade the shots instead of sucking'em in...of course, one missed dodge and it'll leave a mark.

 Lynata wrote:
Kicked down?

Yes. Kicked down.

Rolling 2d10's increases the chance of Righteous Fury, which was all but always going to be successful given that DW Marines don't need to roll it vs xenos. Therefore they caused even more damage.

The errata reduced the damage Bolters cause.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Rolling 2d10's increases the chance of Righteous Fury, which was all but always going to be successful given that DW Marines don't need to roll it vs xenos. Therefore they caused even more damage.

Double chance to inflict an additional average 5.5 points of damage or a guaranteed additional average 3.5 points of damage with every single hit?

I don't even need to calculate further to know which is better. And that's before we take into account that maybe Space Marines, even from the Deathwatch, do not only fight aliens. Or that we're kind of talking about Space Marines in general here, not just DW.

H.B.M.C. wrote:The errata reduced the damage Bolters cause.

Nobody 's denying that. Jex and I were talking about how the first Marine bolters popping up in Dark Heresy had 2d10, and how he thinks 1d10+9 is worse than that.

 Lynata wrote:

Manchu wrote:Nonetheless, the usage is correct.

Not in the dictionaries I have seen.

We've gone through this before. Your understanding of language is sometimes overly literal. Even the Wikipedia article on demi-gods mentions the word is used in ancient Greek sources to describe dead heroes.

Manchu wrote:We've gone through this before. Your understanding of language is sometimes overly literal. Even the Wikipedia article on demi-gods mentions the word is used in ancient Greek sources to describe dead heroes.

If you mean "going by what the books are saying", then yes, I suppose I am overly literal. I'm sticking to the contemporary use of such terms.

Why are we even debating this? The issue was about Space Marines - by the definition you are defending, however, just about everyone in 40k would be a "demi god". This is not what people are discussing here.

I guess both of us are sometimes really just looking for a reason to argue, huh?

 Lynata wrote:
I guess both of us are sometimes really just looking for a reason to argue, huh?

It's just irksome to see you insist to know English usage better than native speakers, especially when you are consistently incorrect and always appeal to dictionaries. As I have mentioned to you before, dictionaries are always behind. In this case, however, that's not even the issue nor is the issue even necessarily the particular idiom of English given we are talking about a term derived from Classical writing. And readily available dictionary entries offer support for this usage. So it's doubly irritating on that score.

At least we are both irritating each other, then.

Being a native speaker is in no way a guarantee for superior grasp of the respective language, and I only appeal to dictionaries when random people on the internet want to tell me things I am apparently supposed to believe simply because they say so. I've learned to be more sceptical than that, so excuse me to take the books over your opinion. Just like you won't give a damn about my opinion about you being "consistently incorrect".

Manchu wrote:And readily available dictionary entries offer support for this usage.

"Hero" is identical to "like or suitable to a god" now? If you say so... you are the native US English speaker, after all.

Dictionaries use a helpful tool called synonyms to approximate meaning in usage by native speakers. If you're going to try to learn a language through a dictionary rather than from educated native speakers, you might as well use a dictionary properly.

As superhuman heroes, Space Marines can be properly described (especially with rhetorical flourish inherent to fantastical fiction) as "demigods" -- at least in English. This is true from a narrative perspective as well as from an in-universe perspective, at least among loyal Imperial citizens ... as Balance already explained.

... which is what I was talking about all along until certain posters barged in to derail the discussion with claims about what other meanings the term "demigod" might have, when the material I was referring to presents it in a rather unmistakeable context that was swept under the proverbial rug in favour of a needless and frustrating argument.
I'll just do us both a favour and try to ignore your attempts to "school" me next time. No promises, though - I do have a bad memory (sometimes a blessing, sometimes a curse).

To reiterate, just because this rhetorical flourish you mentioned labels the Space Marines "demigods", it does not mean they actually have to be "godlike". Some licensed material certainly portrays them as such (the source of my criticism), but when I'm looking at GW I see a different picture. One I prefer both from a balancing perspective as well as because it lets this grimdark universe appear all the more grim and dark when propaganda really is just propaganda.

This is what I actually intended to exchange opinions about back there, chiefly with Balance with whom I had just begun a potentially interesting talk that kinda got sabotaged here.

:/

Not really.

Balance remains correct.

Whatever personal take on 40k (or English) you have, SM can fairly be called demigods according to a number of connotations. Certainly, DW is not "inaccurate" to present them as it does. I mean, I may think the game is mechanically overwrought but it's thematically spot-on. FFG rarely misses when it comes to theme.

Oh and the point of this tangent is that "demigod" does not only mean "godlike." It also refers to superhuman heroism.

First of all, I will agree with Manchu in terms of demi god being a decent term for SM. Second of all, whether I like it or not, DW isn't really inaccurate. There are two types of SM, the more living tank and then the we are the epoch of human genetic evolution and hard core but not going to be able to 1 v 1000 (coughSPACE MARINEcoughbythewayIenjoyedthatgamecough).

Blathering aside, whelp I think I have decided upon buying DH first. Found the DH inquisitorial handbook and hopped on it. Going to get the guide, the core book, and possibly Ascension and Radical. Whilst I have heard they scale into op levels... I also admit that ascension work in terms of scaling up and would allow me to play with some extra themes. The reason to mention the radical really comes down to a leaning of my group. I and my fellow members are primarily leaning in some way to radicalism which means unless we cautiously grab such a thing we will have some difficulty properly representing that.

Still gonna keep my eye on the DHII beta and to observe the ractions to the new beta as well as the fnal release.

Anyways, thank you very much for answering my question! (and with that you can continue on the question of SM and there demigod status )

If you ever played Call of Cthulhu -- and enjoyed it -- the DH should be right up your alley ... well, as long as you also like 40k. And if you haven't plated Call of Cthulhu, I should like to take the opportunity to heartily recommend it. In that game, all the players tend to expect to either go mad or die in the course of investigating some kind of horror. DH played along those lines can be very good, if you manage to find your way around the mechanics.

Never played it, heard of it, psssht it's not like I like HP Lovecraft or anythi... *quickly hides a giant book that clearly has HP Lovecraft inscribed upon it*. Yeah, not at all. But yeah they wouldn't be surprised. I've already pretty much described it as an eldricht horror noiresque grimdark detective game with some brutal and short gunplay. They expect to die, they expect me to mess with their mind people that aren't there helping them out as their minds decay in terror. Then again, I'm the residential Chaos (actually named my iconic LoC Nyarlathotep even though Chaos isn't primarily established upon his books by any means, I've always felt Nyarlathotep felt a bit LoC to me heh) player of our group, building a radical inquisitor force, and the sorts. So yeah I think they are expecting some simple cases that begin to become increasingly maddening and risky as their morality, ethics, and beliefs are constantly tested from the horrors their eyes will yet see.

Anyways I think I have found my next RPG to opt for after 40k besides pathfinder. Mwahahaha

Wow -- it sounds like you ought to give BC a spin instead!

Oh if only I could.... but alas, in our group of 6, I am but one of three that has any force of chaos (which might I add one only has the chaos from the DV that he split with a friend that was new and wanted DA whom this friend has about 2000 points worth and has grown more intrigued with new armies and so he plays them for fun. The other has a force of chaos daemons. Problem comes from he fact that out of us all, 3 of us have a decently sized imperial army, 4 of us have a xenos force (which is why we are opting for Ordo Xenos. Yes if not I would have hopped on Hereticus or more likely Malleus) and, finally, we have two more recent members that really know the basics of the world one being imperial and one being ork.

Eventually I will succumb to BC simply to have more chaotic lore but for now I feel it is best to provide an introduction into the grimdark life of the imperium by way of the Inquisitors. From there, whatever appeals to them most I will expand. Perhaps one lives and sires children that become commisars or guardsman... perhaps they will grow increasingly radical before finally falling to chaos (where I shall gleefully chuckle pulling out my chaotic tomes and music the whispers of chaos muttering beneath the eye that watches back). For now though, I will gladly subside on one of my favorite parts of the Imperium. The place where men dance along the line of loyalty and radicalism as they balane their rights of free thought and others.

*as Lynata mentions also a gradual decline in insanity. I'm more willing to use BC as a progression*

Manchu wrote:Oh and the point of this tangent is that "demigod" does not only mean "godlike." It also refers to superhuman heroism.

Perhaps you should have linked to a site that actually says this, then ...? And here I was working with the sources you have provided for once.

But let's move on, shall we? Obviously, we're moving in circles on that topic.

What I will agree on is that Deathwatch is indeed "thematically spot on" - because DW's theme is Movie Marines and "300 in Space". The designers themselves have said as much in their movie recommendations. And there is nothing wrong with it either! Just as there is nothing wrong with the countless novels that depict Space Marines as semi-invulnerable and immortal gods of war. That's called author's interpretation, or narrative license (some would say: "plot armour"). What is wrong is that a lot of people are limiting their perception to this version of Astartes without even acknowledging that there is another, such as the one in GW's games (including "Inquisitor" which uses d100 too). That's really all there is to it, and the source of my constant gripe.

StarTrotter wrote:coughbythewayIenjoyedthatgamecough

Nothing wrong with that. I did, too.

Manchu wrote:Wow -- it sounds like you ought to give BC a spin instead!

It could certainly be worth a look, yes - unless he's particularly interested in the "slow corruption" theme? BC does kind of have the characters start out where a Radical campaign might eventually end.

... actually, how about starting with Dark Heresy, and then slowly moving over to Black Crusade? Once the characters are sufficiently twisted, engineer their secession and have them re-roll the appropriate characters in BC. Might be an interesting twist? (and this way you could avoid Ascension as well )

I'm kinda saddened that I got BC but never actually had the opportunity to play it. I feel it offers a lot of potential - playing the bad guys can be quite fun, especially with the sort of options the players would be presented with in that game (such as the Minion rules).

 StarTrotter wrote:
Eventually I will succumb to BC simply to have more chaotic lore

IMO, the various "Tomes of ____" supplements have been pretty poor. BC is a mixed bag but it's the most interesting of FFG's 40k RPGs IMO.

 Lynata wrote:
Perhaps you should have linked to a site that actually says this, then ...?

... oh dear ...

You posted a link that gave "superhuman" as a synonym for "demigod." I referred you to Wikipedia. Specifically, take a look at the parts about Homer, Hesiod, and Pindar. Here is an example from modern English:

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote:All mythology opens with demigods, and the circumstance is high and poetic; that is, their genius is paramount. In the legends of the Gautama, the first men ate the earth and found it deliciously sweet.

from Representative Men

And for an example of contemporary usage, see here: America's First Demigod

Semantic debates with Lynata. Has there ever been a more worthwhile endeavour on these boards than that?

Manchu wrote:
IMO, the various "Tomes of ____" supplements have been pretty poor.

*squints*

Care to elaborate?

Awwww shuckles... not even the Tomes of Tzeentch. A tear slides across my eye. I can certainly take a mixed bag eagerly Really though, what intrigues me most is the capability of being a SM that is liberated and or the humans and xenos that have opted for becoming a vessel for chaos for better or, much more likely, just another hell.

Onto DH, which do you all feel are better and worse outside of the core and inquisitor handbook? Part of me is like hey ascension makes sense as well as radical yet at the same time I'm cautious having heard less than pausitive things about several of the books and their content. These two are of particular interest to me.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Care to elaborate?

I find them pretty uneven with Tome of Fate being my favorite so far. Generally, the fluff writing is pretty flavorful and the potted adventures are interesting. The powers are sometimes bit overblown in the description compared to their mechanical effects. And the roleplaying advice is IMO not very interesting or even sound. The most disappointing thing, as I believe I've told you before, is that the archetypes are more powerful than the core ones and they seem a bit more like sample character builds with homes rules than solid, useful choices. Overall, they remind me of the excessive splat of the 3.5 heyday, if a bit more interesting thanks to the license, and I think they are far too expensive. On the other hand, players who like to min/max builds and equipment load outs may find them more interesting than me.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 StarTrotter wrote:
Awwww shuckles... not even the Tomes of Tzeentch.

Funny you should say that; it is my favorite so far -- but I think the Nurgle one stands a chance of beating it out.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 StarTrotter wrote:
Onto DH, which do you all feel are better and worse outside of the core and inquisitor handbook?

I enjoyed both Handbooks but I didn't like Ascension that much.

Manchu wrote:... oh dear ...

I guess you really can't let this go? I was obviously referring to this post.
Why should I have referred to your wikipedia article on how a different culture may have used this term in ages past, when I was specifically talking about contemporary English dictionaries?

I think you are too smart to not have caught this meaning, so I can only assume that you intentionally attempted to distract and divert. As this is no basis for a discussion, and you are apparently disinterested in heeding my request to move on to more interesting topics, I will do us both a favour and, following this post, endeavour to leave this thread alone. Feel free to insult my supposed lack of ability one more time with your insinuations, though. The same offer goes for HMBC, of course, who could not resist the opportunity for a potshot.


*deep breath* With that out of the way ...

StarTrotter wrote:Onto DH, which do you all feel are better and worse outside of the core and inquisitor handbook?

The GM Kit, if you can still get it, is useful. Not only does it feature a rather handy reference screen made of thick and sturdy cardboard, but (by way of a small booklet) also rules for creating custom poisons and your own xenos creatures. Quite useful!
Other than that, I would say it depends entirely on the campaign. The Radical Handbook is neat if you really want to walk the Radical Path (or at least want to feature Radical Inquisitors and their operatives as NPCs and/or a plot source). Creatures Anathema is filled with both animals as well as aliens that you could throw at your players, as well as some rules for alien equipment like (iirc) Eldar rifles. I'm not sure what you have heard about the Radical's Handbook, but (other than a certain gripe rooted in my GW-based interpretation of the setting) I really didn't see any issues with it.

That's about it for my recommendations, though, pre-made adventures aside. Ascension has some very nice ideas, but some of its rules just don't seem to work out very well. I suppose I'd qualify it as a "maybe", depending on how much you really want to have your players advance beyond Rank 8. Also, of course not everything in there is broken, so you could simply cherrypick what you think would work nicely.
Unfortunately, the later supplements seem to feature a distinct power creep, though. Their fluff is well written and colourful, but the classes and gear and rules they introduce just override so much from the core book that you might run into problems balancing the characters "blessed" by the expanded options with the rest of your party. Just google "Dark Heresy Arbites shotgun" and you'll know what I mean.

Feel free to request additional advice and opinions from other Dark Heresy players on FFG's own forum, though - the library of available books has grown quite a bit over the years, and with a limited budget I can certainly understand a desire to carefully select the ones which should be purchased (first).

Whatever you end up with - good luck!

they're all pretty good, but the IH and GM kit are really the base. Creatures Anathema adds adversatries, while Disciplines of the Dark Gods/Radical's add organizations.

The others are mostly career specific (Arbites/Scum, Cleric/Sister, Tech-Priests) and mostly add alternate ranks, backgrounds and lots of ideas.

 Lynata wrote:

Manchu wrote:... oh dear ...

I guess you really can't let this go? I was obviously referring to this post.
Why should I have referred to your wikipedia article on how a different culture may have used this term in ages past, when I was specifically talking about contemporary English dictionaries?

I think you are too smart to not have caught this meaning, so I can only assume that you intentionally attempted to distract and divert. As this is no basis for a discussion, and you are apparently disinterested in heeding my request to move on to more interesting topics, I will do us both a favour and, following this post, endeavour to leave this thread alone. Feel free to insult my supposed lack of ability one more time with your insinuations, though. The same offer goes for HMBC, of course, who could not resist the opportunity for a potshot.


*deep breath* With that out of the way ...

StarTrotter wrote:Onto DH, which do you all feel are better and worse outside of the core and inquisitor handbook?

The GM Kit, if you can still get it, is useful. Not only does it feature a rather handy reference screen made of thick and sturdy cardboard, but (by way of a small booklet) also rules for creating custom poisons and your own xenos creatures. Quite useful!
Other than that, I would say it depends entirely on the campaign. The Radical Handbook is neat if you really want to walk the Radical Path (or at least want to feature Radical Inquisitors and their operatives as NPCs and/or a plot source). Creatures Anathema is filled with both animals as well as aliens that you could throw at your players, as well as some rules for alien equipment like (iirc) Eldar rifles. I'm not sure what you have heard about the Radical's Handbook, but (other than a certain gripe rooted in my GW-based interpretation of the setting) I really didn't see any issues with it.

That's about it for my recommendations, though, pre-made adventures aside. Ascension has some very nice ideas, but some of its rules just don't seem to work out very well. I suppose I'd qualify it as a "maybe", depending on how much you really want to have your players advance beyond Rank 8. Also, of course not everything in there is broken, so you could simply cherrypick what you think would work nicely.
Unfortunately, the later supplements seem to feature a distinct power creep, though. Their fluff is well written and colourful, but the classes and gear and rules they introduce just override so much from the core book that you might run into problems balancing the characters "blessed" by the expanded options with the rest of your party. Just google "Dark Heresy Arbites shotgun" and you'll know what I mean.

Feel free to request additional advice and opinions from other Dark Heresy players on FFG's own forum, though - the library of available books has grown quite a bit over the years, and with a limited budget I can certainly understand a desire to carefully select the ones which should be purchased (first).

Whatever you end up with - good luck!

Thank you very much. I think I'll opt for the radical book, GM kit (still there), the core book, and the ascension to cherry pick as I feel they would like their characters to evolve.